CBS's brain surgery

"How do you remove 10 pounds of ugly fat?" goes the old kids' joke; the answer is: "Cut off your head."

CBS has cut off further episodes of "3 LBS," its drama about neurosurgeons (the title referred to the weight of the human brain; those other seven pounds apparently came from the skull and other ossified elements of network executives' noggins) starring Stanley Tucci. The show fared even worse in the timeslot than heist drama "Smith," which CBS robbed of a future earlier in the season. "The Victoria's Secret Fashion Show," a tasteful reflection upon the urgent issue of women's intimate apparel which had already been scheduled to air 10 p.m. Tuesday, will claim the timeslot next week; what happens thereafter is anyone's guess, though no doubt CBS is no doubt culling its files hoping it has copious outtakes from its underwear extravaganza.

At May's upfronts in New York, the cocksure CBS didn't even mention any midseason replacements, and "3 LBS" wasn't introduced by the network during July's Television Critics Association's press tour, no doubt because it figured they were good to go until January. So few media outlets had any Tucci profiles to run when the show was called into its premature service, which meant precious little free publicity for the show, which, truth be told, wasn't very good to begin with.

Tuesdays at 10 p.m. have been a trouble spot for the network ever since it cancelled "Judging Amy" a couple of years ago. Last season, "Close to Home" faced cancellation there until it was moved to Fridays, where it ultimately performed admirably.

This has been an ongoing concern for the networks, which tend to pull the trigger early on nominally performing series in hopes of finding shows that might do better. Invariably, they don't, which leaves executives scratching their heads at the idea that a mediocre show might actually have proven to be their savior (see: "Boomtown," "Invasion" and, yes, "Smith").